NEWS

Students want answers in racy college ad

Craigslist post solicits food for sex

Students at the University of Vermont want to know if it was one of their own who posted a racy ad to Craigslist.

Students want answers in racy college ad

Craigslist post solicits food for sex

Updated: 11:23 AM EDT Sep 5, 2013

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BURLINGTON, Vt. —

Students at the University of Vermont want to know who is behind a racy Craigslist ad. The post, which first appeared over the weekend, asks for women above the age of 25 to apply as a house cook for 10 UVM seniors, all men, in exchange for sex.

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The post referred to applicants with an acronym for an attractive mother.

The ad first appeared online Saturday, but has since been removed after a request by university police. The post could have come from outside of campus, and the 10 UVM seniors are alleged to have written it.

NewsChannel 5 reached out to the author when the post was active and has yet to hear back.

UVM senior Mike Eaton is familiar with the post. He is the editor-in-chief of the school paper, the Vermont Cynic.

“It was crazy,” Eaton said.

Junior Devin Karambelas is the paper’s managing editor.

“As a 20-year-old student, I definitely think it was a joke,” she said. “It's also something you see and hear about all the time, and I don't think that those students, or not students we don't know yet, would have put out something like that and initially thought it was embarrassing.”

Craigslist does not release names of posters, so it is unclear whether the post came from UVM at all.

Eaton and Karambelas said the post brings them back to December 2011, when someone from the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity asked in a questionnaire, "If I could rape someone, who would it be?" A university investigation later found the entire fraternity was not responsible for the incident.

“Now it's the second thing in just a couple years, so it's bad for UVM on the whole,” Eaton said.

The students said whoever put the post online probably did not realize its potential impact.

“The fact that this happens and a large majority of people either ignore it or don't find significance in it, I think that brings up an even bigger issue about how my generation feels toward women and using this kind of language,” Karambelas said.

A university spokesman said police will “make a determination about whether the post constitutes any violation of law.” The Cynic students said police were looking at a potential solicitation charge.

As of Wednesday, a spokesman said police had nothing new to report in their investigation.